


Thinking of Her

by MyOwnSuperintendent



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon Sexual Content, F/M, Past Character Death--Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 21:02:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5470679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyOwnSuperintendent/pseuds/MyOwnSuperintendent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the Red Wedding, Ned and Brienne travel together, searching for Sansa and Arya.  Their task is difficult enough--but missing Catelyn is still more difficult.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thinking of Her

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Game of Ships' Countdown to Wintertown
> 
> I don't own A Song of Ice and Fire or anything related to it. Hope you enjoy!

They have been traveling together for two moons now, and yet they have barely talked. He has never been one to talk much, even when he is not buried in the depths of grief; he has no idea whether Lady Brienne is less quiet under happier circumstances.

In truth, he does not know much of Lady Brienne at all.   He knows the most important thing, though: that she served Cat loyally and tried to save her at that horrible wedding. There are times when he is almost angry with her—why didn’t she try harder?—but it is nothing to the anger he feels at himself and at his own impotence, at the way he languished in a dungeon while his wife’s throat was cut. For her loyalty, for her obvious love of Cat, for the way that she has told him plainly that Cat wanted to get the girls back and that that is exactly what she intends to do, he trusts Lady Brienne, and he is grateful for her companionship.

When they do talk, it is always on one of two subjects: their plans or Cat. Neither is without its pitfalls. It is difficult to discuss their plans when they do not truly have any. When he had joined other prisoners in an escape from the Red Keep’s dungeons, taking advantage of the chaos in King’s Landing, he had hoped to rejoin his family; instead he found his wife and sons murdered and his daughters spirited gods knew where. He had happened upon Lady Brienne while seeking them, but she knew no more of their whereabouts than he did. They must follow the most tenuous of clues in their search, and almost everything ends up leading nowhere. And they can’t very well go around drawing attention to themselves—not when everyone believes him dead—which hinders them still more.

And talking of Cat is often horribly painful. When he first met Lady Brienne and learned her story, he had asked her to tell him what had really happened at the Red Wedding; he was sure that the truth would be better than the rumors that bewildered him and made him feel sick. Instead of telling him, though, she had looked at him and said, “I am not sure that you want to hear.”

“I do,” he had said. “Tell me what they did to them.”

Lady Brienne met his gaze with her own. “I am not sure that she would want you to hear.” He was about to insist, but when she added, in a voice that was an odd combination of conviction and gentleness, “She would not want to cause you that sort of pain,” he stopped. His mind was filled with all sorts of horrible imaginings, but Lady Brienne sounded so certain that Cat would not have wanted him to know. He could barely breathe then, thinking of her, and it took him a moment to register that Lady Brienne was speaking again. “She stayed so strong, Lord Stark. Even in the last moments.”

“Of course,” he said dimly. He would have expected no less from Cat, and he only wished that he could have been there to share her burdens, to comfort her, to allow her the chance to not have to be so strong.   Of course, she wouldn’t have had those burdens to shoulder if she hadn’t thought that he was dead, if he hadn’t been so damnably stupid, if he hadn’t practically laid a trap for himself and then walked right into it… Remembering that Lady Brienne was still there, he forced himself to speak. “She was always strong,” he said. “I never knew any woman—any person—half so strong.”

Lady Brienne nodded. “She had such courage,” she said. “It was why I swore her my service.”

Over their two months together, Lady Brienne has told him more of the time that she spent with Cat. There are times when he cannot hear enough, when he thinks that the only thing that can keep him from utterly collapsing at his loss is hearing about her from someone who cared for her deeply, from this girl who talks of Cat’s cleverness, her bravery, her love. He drinks in her words even as it pains him to hear of Cat’s pain, and when she talks of how determined Cat was to recover the girls, it only strengthens his own resolve. He vows a thousand vows that he will keep them always safe and never allow them to forget their mother.

And there are other times when each word is like being stabbed, when he simply cannot take the pain of being reminded that he will always be without Cat. He cuts Lady Brienne off abruptly at these times. “Forgive me,” he says, dimly aware that he is being rude, but she always nods and seems to understand.

There are also times when he wants to talk himself, and he tells Lady Brienne all about Cat then; he has the absurd thought that in speaking of her now, he will somehow make her feel the love that he never spoke of enough. He tells of how hers was the ear he wanted whenever he had a difficult decision to make, how her words always seemed to be just right. He tells of the joy it brought him to see her with their children (which only brings on the other aches, the ones for their three sons). He tells of how he had never seen anyone more beautiful.

Which leads to thoughts of which he certainly cannot tell Lady Brienne, and for which there is no respite. Alone at night, at the succession of inns where they stay, he cannot stop picturing Cat—Cat lying naked in their bed with her beautiful hair loose around her and her cheeks brilliantly flushed, Cat with her lips against his, Cat squirming in pleasure as he presses kisses to every inch of her soft skin and moves down to taste her, Cat crying out as they move together. His own hand on his cock brings release but no true relief; it is not like touching her and being touched in return, like seeing her smiles, at times wicked and at times impossibly sweet. There are moments when he thinks he may go mad from it.

He cannot go mad—he still has so much to do—and he throws himself still more into the search for the girls in the hopes that it will keep him sane. Lady Brienne is nearly as invested as he is, and he is grateful for that. While she almost never talks of herself, he finds that he comes to know more about her as the time passes: that she is brave and kind and truly a good woman, and he is left in no doubt as to why Cat valued her.

He tells her as much one evening, and she gives him one of her tentative smiles. “It is good of you to say that, Lord Stark,” she says.

“It is true,” he says.

“It meant much to me that she did,” she says. “Not many people would, after all. I’m… well, I’m neither one thing nor the other. Not fit to be a warrior or a wife.” He has never heard her speak like this. “But Lady Catelyn…she wanted my service. She was…she was a great lady.” Her voice is full of sorrow and of love, and the pain is sharp and harsh.

His only thought is to make it all stop, and perhaps it does stop for a few seconds—perhaps touching someone he cares for again brings him a certain respite from pain. But the moment after he kisses her, he knows that it was wrong. He was wrong—he should not have done it, he was taking advantage, she is closer in age to his children than to him, and she is here to help him find the girls, not to have him paw at her. And she was wrong—he had to lean up into the kiss rather than down, he felt hard muscles under his hands rather than soft curves, and he could not run his hands through that short sandy hair. It was through no fault of hers, he knows, but she was no less wrong, and he feels no less horrible.

“I…Lady Brienne…forgive me,” he stammers, and he hurries from the inn’s common room before either of them can say another word.

 

She knows that Lord Stark thought it wrong to kiss her, and she understands why, but she cannot feel the same. Of course they do not love each other; what he shared with Lady Catelyn was something very precious, and she is not fool enough to believe that his kiss means that it has suddenly ceased, nor does she feel anything for him beyond respect and friendship. But she has never been kissed before out of anything but mockery, and there is a difference. It was a comfort to feel that closeness, however brief. She hopes that the kiss at least brought him a similar comfort in the moment, as distraught as he seemed when he left the room.

These past months have been hard. At times she has been nearly overwhelmed by the guilt of not being able to save Lady Catelyn. She had nothing to give but her service, and it turned out to be a poor sort of service, as she struggled to free herself from the table on top of her as her lady’s throat was cut. She had barely managed her own escape from the Twins after that, but she had been determined; if she was too late to save her lady, she was going to save her lady’s daughters. And while this goal has kept her going, that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t sometimes lie awake at night, picturing the scene over and over, hating the Freys and hating herself.

Lord Stark’s company has been a help. She offered him her aid as soon as she learned who he was, that he was somehow alive after all; Lady Catelyn’s love for him was the only spur she needed. She knows that, profound as her own grief is, his is immeasurably worse: he and Lady Catelyn were man and wife for more than sixteen years, and then he has lost his sons too. She knows that his burdens must be incredibly heavy, and she has taken on as much as she can—as much as he will let her—to try to spare him. Lady Catelyn would have wanted her to do this, she believes. And he is a good man in his own right—his own actions and the respectful way he treats her have confirmed the picture that Lady Catelyn’s words gave her of him—and aiding him is no hardship to Brienne. It is comforting just to be able to talk about her lady with someone who knew her well. Sometimes she seems to live again in their words, which is both a pleasure and a pain, for her and, she suspects, for him.

The kiss, then, was not about any love between them but about the love they both hold for a dead woman and the ache that it leaves in them. She understands this, and she thinks perhaps if she tells Lord Stark that he will not feel guilty. She rises from her seat and goes in search of him.

She knocks at the door to his room and enters in response to the muffled sound of acknowledgement that he makes. He is sitting on the bed, and while there are no tears in his eyes or on his cheeks, he is shaking badly. She sits beside him, and he flinches.

“Don’t,” she says. “Please, Lord Stark, you don’t have to feel sorry. You didn’t hurt me. And you didn’t betray her. I understand why you…It is all right.” He does not answer her, and he shakes still, and she is not sure what to do. She is worried that touching him will only increase his guilt, but she can think of no other idea, and so she wraps her arms around his shoulders. “It is all right,” she says again. “You just miss her. I know. I know. She was the most wonderful lady.” Still he is shaking, and she holds him tight. She will make sure he is well. For Lady Catelyn.

It seems a long time before he stills. “Forgive me,” he says again.

She is not sure if he is apologizing for the kiss again or for this most recent encounter, but either way her answer is the same. “There is nothing to forgive.”

“I loved her so much,” he says.

“I know,” she says.


End file.
